The fate of American places is not a private concern of other people. Their struggles are our struggles. Their catastrophes are a cancer on our body politic. It is desperately urgent, the most urgent problem we face in my view, to mend some of the many ways that we find ourselves fraying as a nation.
A writer I really enjoy, if some of you are not familiar.
Gary Cohn, the former Goldman Sachs executive who is shaping economic policy in the White House, told lawmakers in a private meeting this week that he supported a policy of separating deposit-taking from riskier investment banking.
Interesting, albeit anecdotal, selection of declarations of what would turn his base against him. Shows where his weaknesses are at, and what betrayals will raise hackles.
Isn’t it ironic, don’t you think, that a reality TV host got elected leader of the free world? That the corporate media mocked his rants about a rigged system and yet he won anyway? It’s like Zuckerberg making billions publishing fake right wing news but lowly media minnow Breitbart is the villain. It’s like a buffoonish misogynist defeating a highly qualified woman. It’s like that woman spending eight (twelve? thirty?) years locking up the Establishment’s support and then it turns out the electorate doesn’t trust the establishment. It’s a hundred crass celebrity ads when all you needed was a rust-belt listening tour. Isn’t it just so Ironic, don’t you think?
Farmers have produced less food during the past three decades than they would have done were climate change not happening, according to a study published today1. Global maize (corn) production, for example, is estimated to be about 3.8% lower than it would have been in a non-warmed world — the equivalent of Mexico not contributing to the maize market.
The Obama administration is seeking to use the killing of Osama bin Laden to accelerate a negotiated settlement with the Taliban and hasten the end of the Afghanistan war, according to U.S. officials involved in war policy.
This is the best I could find. Others may want to add links in the comments if they find better/more details elsewhere.
Of the 38 bn cut, It looks like its half cuts in entitlements ( $4.9 billion from a Justice Department fund for crime victims; $400 million from a fund to seize assets from organized crime; and roughly $550 million from the SMART Grant student-aid program), and half in discretionary (no details in this article!?!) with the defence budget largely spared.
Here's the main question. If the Libyan people knew what kind of money went into Libyan state coffers from overseas multinationals, and if they could see precisely how much left the country, would they have turfed out the Gaddafi dynasty by now and installed a proper democratic parliamentary system?
An international survey that may enlighten our ongoing debate here about whether America is a center-right country or not, whether Americans have a blind faith in the virtues of private business. Here's an extended extract for those without access to the FT:
Americans have grown less trusting of business in the past year, bucking a global trend of rising confidence in companies, governments and other institutions, according to data to be presented at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
More than 70 percent of Americans say big bonuses should be banned this year at Wall Street firms that took taxpayer bailouts, a Bloomberg National Poll shows.
An additional one in six favors slapping a 50 percent tax on bonuses exceeding $400,000. Just 7 percent of U.S. adults say bonuses are an appropriate incentive reflecting Wall Street’s return to financial health.
